sidv : work is play is life » Life

How would you like it?

Siddharth Vanchinathan — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 05:01:46 +0000

How would you like it?
Rained in, gloomy skies,
Bright yellow flames of the fireplace crackling,
Hand in hand with your mother,
Enjoying some intimate conversation?

How would you like it?
Still waters, peaceful surroundings,
Dim red ruby setting in the distance,
Hands in the cool lake waters,
Enjoying a moment of introspection?

How would you like it?
Tall weeds, harvest wheat,
Afternoon sun beating down on bare skin,
Stick of sugarcane in your hands,
Enjoying some earthly pleasures?

How would you like it?
Ripe grapes, wet feet,
A jolly gathering of best friend,
Fresh ruby wine on your lips,
Enjoying a merry evening?

How would you like it?
Stone gray, lifeless machines,
Black suits in an empty conference room,
Glass and steel surrounding,
Living out this mundane routine?

I owe Steve Jobs.

Siddharth Vanchinathan — Thu, 06 Oct 2011 05:44:27 +0000

Below is an excerpt from Steve’s speech at the Stanford commencement in 2005. My decision to change my career after graduating from Manipal was because of these words.

“Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything—all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure—these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.

Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma—which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice.”

He was my hero and inspiration. It feels like a personal loss.

Happy MMXI

Siddharth Vanchinathan — Fri, 31 Dec 2010 18:12:18 +0000

The Train Station

Siddharth Vanchinathan — Thu, 16 Dec 2010 06:46:15 +0000

Bare tracks lay in wait for the mammoth locomotives to chug by. I wait, on a bench for my train to arrive. The light is dim, it is the time for the sun to rise. Artificial lights turn everything into blue white. A stray dog limps by looking for someone to feed him his morning meal. It is quiet. I am early. Tea vendors are a bright spot on the platform. Crowded with morning tea drinkers, colorful with the variety of fatty edibles on sale. The newspaper vendor walks by, breaking the silence with a sharp call of the morning headlines. I am enticed to buy one.

The lights are still red, when will my journey begin? Large victorian pillars that have stood the test of time remind me to be patient. An announcement sounds – a melodious tone and then a crisp voice says that the train will be delayed. The sun has risen now. Warm yellows fill the air, and light up the haze of the morning cold. Almost immediately, the platforms begins to fill. More impatient people break the silence with their chatter. All waiting for their journeys to begin.

The train arrives. I brace myself for loud horn as the spanking new electric engine passes me by. As the train slows to a stop, the crowd lunges for the doors. I am caught in the confusion; desperately holding onto my bags and my clothes, I dive into sleeper coach. The crowd thins, people have found their seats, and have bid their relatives goodbye. Some tears fly.

I wrestle into my side berth, warm morning rays light up the coach cut only by horizontal iron bars of the windows. Warm sun, cool air, I think of all the times I have travelled the railways. I am flooded with childhood memories, memories of sitting in dad’s arms at the nearby train station waiting for the 7:15 AM Madras Mail to pass by. The love for the railways started at a young age methinks.

The lights have turned green. The distant horn of the engine signals departure.

An Ode…

Siddharth Vanchinathan — Mon, 25 Oct 2010 18:27:20 +0000

Those were the days, in memory now like a lost love.

Picturesque surroundings, undulating terrain.

It’s where we were free birds, flying flights of hope and imagination.

Learning the ways of the world, climbing the ladders of success.

Times of innocence, times of experiments.

Where time stood still, and yet flew by so quick.

It’s where bonds were forged in stone, lifetimes lived.

Broke the chiseled confines of our upbringings and discovered new.

Ideas, experiences, stories and lives exchanged,

In the world of Manipal that was our home.

We lived every second, every minute of every day

Lived like there was no tomorrow.

Nature’s elements played an orchestrated symphony,

Sun shone, lashed away at the spring flowers,

Clouds burst, quenched the parched land,

Winter came, and went, in a fleeting moment.

We were prepared, to go head first

Into the world that beckoned like a known enemy,

We fought, lived and loved every moment.

Those were the days, in memory now like a lost love.

Childhood Lessons

Siddharth Vanchinathan — Mon, 20 Sep 2010 01:09:27 +0000

Everyone has one. Some more fun than others, some more restrained than others, some more creative than others, and some more rigourous than others. Eventually, it turns you into the adult that you are now. The formative years of childhood is probably restricted to years 8-12 in my opinion (not based on any studies, that’s from personal experience). It’s that time of your life when you’re smarter as a kid and are more aware of the world as it is. It’s when you begin exploring the world beyond mud castles and eating dirt. It’s when you discover who you are and what you like doing.

My childhood was filled with building stuff. Origami books, paper planes, paper airports, paper what-not. Lego, mechanix, gwbasic. Looking back now I see in childhood-me a desire to create. A desire so strong to break apart and make anew. It gave me a thrill like no other. Also, I grew up most of the formative years in school with both my parents working. They probably felt that I needed something to keep myself occupied and kept this desire of mine satiated with more and more stuff I could build. I can’t thank them enough for that.

I would come back from school to an empty house with food on the table. I would eat, watch ninja turtles and go into my work room. The third bedroom in our house was filled with my stuff. A bed where noone could find place to sleep because it was strewn with paper all over. I had only one lego architectural set. With that I built everything from houses to ships. I remember even planning out the layout of the houses that I built. I had built whole airports out of paper and glue. Also among my creations was a chain link about 4 feet long out of blanks of cigarette packing (waste material brought back from office by mom for my exploits). However hard I try to recall it’s design and how I managed to make it, it eludes me. And I’m guessing the thought will keep bugging me till I find it.

At this point in my life with a ton of new things going around me, I am forced to think about my past and how I ended up being where I am. I get immense comfort in the fact that I’m here because I know what I want to do and I love doing it. As ironic as it is, I’m doing what I loved doing as an unassuming kid who would spend most of his holidays creating things.

Dare I say, A person spends a lifetime satisfying only his childhood desires.

Auto-Friendly Guerilla Movement

Siddharth Vanchinathan — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 05:57:43 +0000

As you all may know, auto rickshaws in Bangalore aren’t the most friendly of the lot. Getting around in Bangalore, specially if you don’t know your way around, is expensive and troublesome. There are ofcourse the good guys who claim that the bad guys have defamed the community by tampering with meters and harrasing customers for extra money. I also know of a friend who had 2 teeth broken because he refused to pay the extra 10 bucks demanded from the driver. The police are probably hand in pocket with some of their unions and hence they are unafraid of any police action. I use auto rickshaws pretty frequently and I make sure that I get into autos only if they go by the meter.

So here’s a solution – Gandhi guerilla style. It’s a quiet guerilla movement that will be driven by the consumer and will eventually end up becoming a validation system for autos. Atleast that’s what I want it to become. It’s pretty simple really, print these stickers (or take them from me) and stick the relevant ones anywhere on the auto when you finish a ride. Slowly but steadily these stickers will become more visible as more people take to this movement and the auto drivers will also aspire to have these “auto-friendlys” on their autos. The friendlys will become like what badges are for pizza delivery boys. A rating and a validation system that at a single glance will tell the customer that this auto driver is a good guy and will not cheat you. Here are the intial three stickers – the meter friendly, the people friendly and the traffic rules friendly.

And here’s what autos may look like with these friendlys on them.

A Friendly Auto

Ofcourse ideas for more friendlys are always welcome and maybe I’ll put out the template so everyone can make their own friendlys. Let me know what you think about the campaign. Whether this will help people or will drivers take advantage and print fake ones? Let’s organize an “Auto Friendly” tweetup to distribute these stickers sometime!

Happy OH10!

Siddharth Vanchinathan — Fri, 01 Jan 2010 10:18:57 +0000

Here’s wishing everyone a very happy and prosperous OH10!

Happy Diwali!

Siddharth Vanchinathan — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 10:11:48 +0000

My Tryst with IDC, IIT Bombay

Siddharth Vanchinathan — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 19:39:29 +0000

This is going to be a post with strong words so be warned. And to the IDCians I know, I don’t mean any disrespect, this is my personal experience.

It all started with me wanting to become a product designer quite a while back. When I gave my CEED exam the year I was graduating (2008), I was not aware of the procedure of admission at IDC (Industrial Design Center) and presumed it would begin after the results were declared. To my shock, I find from the day the results are out, I have only a week to prepare my application and send it by post all while I was working at Cisco doing my internship. “What logic is that?” I said to myself and dismissed IDC as a bunch of people who didn’t know logic. I was ignorant, forgive me.

Cut to 2009, I am working at a design studio run by an ex-IDCian. I now know a lot more about it and I consider it to be one of the top design schools in India (or atleast my research told me so). I was more keen on applying abroad – but decided at the last minute to give it a shot. My CEED score from the previous year was valid this year too. So I fill in my application, complete the three “tasks” allotted and send it in. During this application process I discover that the CEED is merely a qualifying exam for IIT Bombay and a host of other colleges. The colleges then conduct their own tests to shortlist candidates for admission. No logic here either, the CEED is a good exam! According to me, it is a pretty good indicator of your aptitude for design. Anyway, I am noone to decide this, so I went along with the process.

One month later, the list comes up on the IDC website with my name on it along with 300 others. I am supposed to receive a call letter confirming my selection for the next round but I get none. A quick phone call to the IDC office and they say it’s ok, come along anyway. So me and my friend (who incidentally also got selected) book flight tickets for Bombay for all the three days of the selection process.

Cut to today – 18th June, 2009. Reached Bombay early in the morning and reached the IIT campus just in the nick of time. Had a tough time finding our way to the Convocation Hall (the venue of the test, considering IDC is part of IIT – they should do something about their wayfinding signage – it’s pretty pathetic!). The test entails designing a vegetable carrier to be mounted on a bicycle. According to me I had a pretty good solution and I had presented it well. I noticed that the table in front of me (bearing roll no IDC-067 – if you’re reading this, congrats you got selected!) was empty – ABSENT!. Results were to be announced at 5 PM.

Off Topic: One warning to people joining IIT Bombay – Hostel 6 is pretty sad. Manipal hostels rock!

Back to the topic: We decided to drop back into the main IDC building to check it out and look at our future department and the kind of work that’s going on. To be frank, I was very very impressed with the Visual Communication dept. Swarna – the design degree show was on all the work done by the grads this year were on show. Again VC was impressive. Most people designing mobile applications seem to be over inspired by the iphone icons though – no originality in that respect. Product design was not too impressive and I shall leave it at that. Outside there were posters of each department (there are 4 – product, visual, animation and interaction) with a one liner tag line for each. Anim said: We not only move lines, we move people. Interaction said: Let the two halves of your brain interact (or something to that effect). VC had a good line too. PD said “Aesthetics with practicality”. Hmmmm, now PD is not only aesthetics is it? and who does copy for things like this! Totally put me off. Back to the main topic, I seem to be straying a lot.

A First List was published with selected candidates and was immediately withdrawn since it contained gross errors – candidate’s name appeared twice etc etc. After another hour long wait, the next list came out and to be frank I was pretty confident that I would clear the test atleast. I didn’t. Neither did my buddy. I went through the list a couple of times, checking each name twice just to make I hadn’t missed out. Surprise! Surprise! Roll 067′s name is on the list! Wow!

Ok now here’s the deal. If the profs who conduct this selection process are reading, then listen up! You don’t call 300 people to Bombay from all over India just to give a test (300 in PD, I’m not sure about the numbers in the other depts). If you’re calling them to your city, atleast give them a chance to talk to you, give them an interview. You don’t send 210 people back on the basis of not clearing a test. This is the design field, you cannot judge somebody’s design capabilities by what they do in a 1.5 hr exam. You need to look through their portfolio, see their work and talk to them about their ideas. If you had to conduct a test to reduce numbers, do it in the major cities, or do it as a part of the application, or do it online!

I am quite relieved that I was not on that list. Because joining such a design school would be quite a waste of 2 years (You may think this is a case of sour grapes, it probably is). If you read my previous post it talked about design education in India and the problems with it. Now the confusion is gone – it is “to go”.